Hey look, an update. How 'bout that.
Tony couldn't sleep.
This was nothing new, as he'd been having trouble sleeping ever since the battle of New York; At least with the more recent one he'd avoided any near-death experiences.
When Tony went down to the kitchen he wasn't at all surprised to see Loki sitting at the counter, calmly drinking from a ceramic mug. Tony joined him shortly after pouring his own drink, something a lot stronger than tea. They sat in silence for a few minutes before Tony decided it was getting a little awkward.
"I'm sorry," he said tentatively. "About everything that's happened, about everything that can't happen." He waited for Loki to look at him before continuing. "This thing with Pepper . . . . I still want what we had, but I don't want to lose her. I feel like I've lost too much as it is."
Loki sighed, and he had an almost melancholy expression. Tony was about to try and say something else but Loki's next words sent a chill down his spine.
"How inconvenient for me that my magic is gone, or I could easily be rid of this woman; I could still easily snap her neck, though."
Tony swallowed and gave Loki a wide-eyed look. Yup, definitely not the same Loki he'd known (and quite possibly loved). "What the hell happened to you?"
Loki stood from his seat, staring Tony dead in the eye. "Wouldn't you like to know?" was all he said before turning to leave the room.
Tony stood up so fast his chair knocked over, and he made a grab for Loki's wrist.
"Unhand me!" Loki snarled, yanking his hand free. Tony just grabbed it again.
"I'm serious, Loki, what the hell happened to you?" Tony persisted.
"I believe we've been over this, Stark—I'm powerless and surrounded by enemies—"
"Not that!" Tony interjected. "Before the battle of New York, before any of this. Thor told us you tried to destroy an entire world, and the Loki I knew never would have done that." He paused and took a deep breath. "Now I'm gonna ask again—what the hell happened to you?"
Loki remained silent.
"I meant what I said, you know—about still loving you." Shit, he hadn't meant to use the L-word; oh well, too late to back out now. "Things are really confusing and fucked up right now, but I want you to know I never stopped loving you. Fuck, the whole reason I distanced myself from our daughter was because she reminded me of you. I only remembered Lorna Aven, but she's a part of you and I never could let her go."
Loki looked skeptical.
"C'mon, you know I'm no good with this kind of thing—what I'm trying to say is you can trust me. You can tell me anything, and I will listen to all of it. I won't tell anyone and I won't judge you, because believe me when I say I have no room to judge anyone else's fucked-up life."
Loki swallowed and wouldn't look at Tony. "I doubt my story would hold your interest." He was trying to sound nonchalant, but his voice cracked.
Tony made a split-second decision and let go of Loki's wrist long enough to yank his shirt off over his head, exposing the arc reactor and bathing both of them in soft blue light. "Tell you what—a story for a story; you tell me yours, I tell you mine." He tapped on the reactor. "I'll tell you about Afghanistan, the shrapnel in my heart, Obie—the whole nine yards."
Loki tilted his head and stared at the reactor. "I could not bring you under the scepter's power," he said quietly, reaching out to lay a hand over the reactor. "All because of this—this one piece of midgardian machinery." His gaze moved back up to lock with Tony's. "I will hear your tale, Stark, and I will tell you mine—perhaps."
Tony grinned, because a 'maybe' from Loki was almost always as good as a 'yes.'
Telling Loki about Afghanistan wasn't as hard as Tony thought it would be, but it was still hard. By the time he got to the Battle Royale between him and Obie, he was shaking slightly. He glossed over the palladium poisoning and Ivan Vanko, but still gave enough information to paint Loki a decent picture of what happened.
They'd moved upstairs to Tony's room and were sitting on his bed, and Tony leaned back against the headboard when he was done talking.
Loki was silent for what seemed like forever. When he did speak, it wasn't what Tony expected to hear.
"I believe Thor has already informed you that I was adopted."
Tony nodded once and waited for him to continue.
"Asgardians and Jotuns—Frost Giants—have been enemies for centuries, ever since Odin Allfather and the armies of Asgard stopped the Jotuns from invading Midgard. The battle moved to Jotunheim, the Jotunns' home world, and they were defeated. Odin took their main power source, and . . . and a babe, abandoned in a temple and left to die. He placed an enchantment on the babe's skin, causing it to look like an Asgardian, and then he raised the child as his own, in hopes to later unite the kingdoms."
Loki closed his eyes and Tony had to restrain himself from jerking away from the god.
Loki's skin had turned blue and his eyes were blood red.
"I was raised to hate the Frost Giants—they were the monsters who hid under misbehaving Asgardian childrens' beds. To find out I was one of them . . . ."
The initial shock wore off and Tony reached out to trace the raised markings on Loki's hand. Loki jerked his hand back and said, "Believe me, you really don't want to do that."
Tony pulled his hand back in his lap. He blinked, and Loki was back to pale skin and green eyes. "It was after Thor's banishment that I found out my true parentage—son of Laufey, king of the Frost Giants."
"Thor was banished because he almost started a war, right?" asked Tony. "He told us he did some pretty stupid things."
Loki laughed bitterly. "Stupid does not begin to cover it; Thor was nowhere near ready to take the throne—he was brash, boastful, arrogant, and had absolutely no humility. He would have made a poor king, but I was the only one to realize this. I ruined his coronation, yes, but I never intended to get him banished. Thor was gone, and I found out my whole life had been a lie. I had an argument with Odin, and the strain sent him into the Odinsleep, leaving me as acting King regent of Asgard."
"Is that when you tried to kill Thor and keep the throne all for yourself?" Tony hadn't meant to say that out-loud, but it still slipped out.
Surprisingly, Loki laughed. "Very good, Stark, yes; my plans backfired, though, and Thor returned to stop me from destroying Jotunheim with the Bifrost. We fought, he destroyed the bridge, and we both fell. Thor held on, but I . . . I let go."
It looked like talking was causing Loki pain. "I let go, and I fell. I fell, and I fell, through the darkness, all the way to the roots of Yggdrasil."
"The world Tree," Tony murmured thoughtfully. "I read about the myths," he said at Loki's surprised face, and nodded for him to continue.
Loki licked his lips and he blinked a few times. "The roots of the World Tree were never meant to bee seen—not by any sane man. I was half-mad when the Other found me, and had almost no will of my own. I say almost because I did still have resistance; I didn't want to be a pawn in someone else's game, so I refused him."
Tony recognized the haunted look in Loki's eyes. "They tortured you," he said slowly, only just realizing this himself.
"Did you truly believe I would want to rule this realm?" Loki asked quietly. "I never truly wanted Asgard's throne—why would I want a world as pitiful as Earth?"
Tony frowned. "It's not that pitiful," he said. "Beisdes, I thought you liked Earth better than Asgard—at least, I remember you telling me something along those lines." He held up a hand. "Nope, don't answer that, getting off track; so, to sum things up, Thor is banished, you find out you're adopted, you become king, Thor comes back, you two fight, you fall, then the Chitauri torture you and make you do their bidding. Yes?"
"You make it all sound so simple." Loki sounds tired, and he looks exhausted. "Are you satisfied now, Stark? Do you have the answers you sought? Will you cease your pestering now, and leave me be? I will not sit here and act as if nothing has changed—no so long as your heart belongs to another." Before Tony could say anything, Loki got up from the bed and left the room.
Loki avoided Tony after their late-night heart-to-heart.
The Avengers got called out, and Loki was taken along to help where he could. He worked with Iron Man if it was necessary, but after they beat the bad guy and called it a day, and Tony was out of the suit, Loki went right on back to avoiding him.
"Something's up with Mom and Dad," Erika commented to Jormungand after witnessing Loki's avoidance for herself. "I have no idea what happened, but they're acting like five year olds," she sighed, stirring her coffee and leaning back against the counter.
"Perhaps your father said something less than savory to mine," Jormungand suggested.
"Oh, so it's impossible for the sass master also known as Loki to have said something offensive? Puh-lease," she said, rolling her eyes. "That man takes insulting people to whole new levels." After a second, she shrugged and added, "Dad can bee pretty mean, too, though, and I'm sure the love triangle isn't helping much."
Jormungand cocked his head. "Love triangle?" he asked, sounding genuinely confused.
Erika gesture with her hands while talking. "Yeah, you know—person A likes person B, person B likes person C, and person C circles back around with their feelings for person A; in this case, though, it's a case of person A liking both persons' B and C, with Dad being A and Loki and Pepper being B and C."
Jormungand snorted. "That's hardly a triangle; merely a feeble mortal man who can't make up his mind."
"Hey, don't be disrespecting my daddy!" A beat, then, "He is kind of a manwhore, though, I'll give you that." She took a sip of her coffee before putting the cup down and hopping up on the counter. She swung her legs and drummed the surface of the counter. "While we're on the topic of romances, how's it going with you and your attempts to woo Capsicle?"
Jormungand didn't answer her.
"Ooh, that bad, huh? How hard did he shoot you down?"
Jormungand mumbled a reply.
"Eh? Didn't quite catch that, sorry."
"I said, 'I cannot be refused if I do not ask,'" he huffed.
Erika's eyes widened and she stopped drumming her fingers on the counter. "Please tell me that doesn't mean what I think it means."
Jormungand said nothing.
"Oh my god, it does! You haven't even tried asking him out, have you?" she asked incredulously, hopping down off the counter. "Jor, come on, we talked about this! Just go for it, the worst he can say is no!"
"No the worst he can say is decidedly worse than 'no,' and I don't particularly care to hear any of it," Jormungand snapped. "Erika, please, I know you mean well, but you must trust me when I say that there is very little chance of Steven Rogers ever 'falling for me,' as you would say."
Erika frowned. "But what if he says yes? Why are you so afraid of taking a chance?"
"I know his type—straight as an arrow and probably utterly repulsed with the mere thought of laying with another man," Jormungand bit out. "There's a Midgardian phrase that would best describe my feelings—'been there, done that.'
Erika was confused for all of three seconds before realization dawned on her. "Someone hurt you, didn't they?" she asked quietly.
"Your powers of deduction are astounding," he muttered. "If you must know—and I know you will ask—it was before I was banished. I was young for an Asgardian, not a boy but not yet a man. I switched between serpent and human constantly, and when I was human I fell under the charms of a young warrior. He was polite to me, at the very least, and in my naivety I thought his politeness was his way of saying he was interested, since he was the only one who ever bothered to be polite to me. I let him know of my feelings, and it . . . . . ended badly." He sighed, his shoulders slumping slightly. "Captain Rogers reminds me so much of him—it's what infatuated me in the first place. This fact alone tells me he will most certainly react in the same way if I was to 'make a move,' and I don't want my already fragile relationship with the Captain to shatter completely."
Jormungand should have seen it coming, but he was still surprised when Erika threw herself at him and hugged him tight. "I'm sorry," she said in a shaky voice, sounding like she was on the verge of tears. "I'm so, so sorry, Jor."
Jormungand didn't hug her back, but he didn't push her away.
A/N: So, this chapter and Jormungand angst were completely unplanned. Don't worry, then next one will be better :)